The Sixty Years of Rock and Japan (3) The Beatles awoke people to rock bands
The Beatles in 1964 came to Japan without any time differences
1964 was the year when Tokyo Olympic, which should have been called 'the symbol of the high economic growth', was held and in addition to it the culture and fashions for young people changed very much then. 'Ivy look' like blazer coats, button-down shirts,cotton pants came in Japan and men's fashions became sophisticated. And 'Heibon Punch', a magazine taking an expansive approach to things to which Japan had been close till then like sexual expression and underground culture became a big issue. these sophistication and expansion of generosity might have people accept new stimuli. And The Beatles appeared then.
As for the enthusiasm in Japan about The Beatles, the non-music media now seems to tell that it started on 1966 when they came to Japan for the first time. However actually The Beatles' sensation started at the stage of February, 1964. Then The Beatles ranked first on the billboard single chart for the first time with 'I Want to Hold Your Heart', and at the same time they debuted in Japan with this song. And in the late March, they made the cover of the April number of 'Music Life'. The magazine had been a Japanese pop music journal until the previous year, but it changed itself to the first western music journal in Japan with The Beatles movement.
And The Beatles established an unheard - of record to occupy top five on the billboard single chart of April 4th, but the same thing occurred in Japan. On May 11th, about one month after then, The Beatles occupied first,fifth, sixth,seventh on '95 million popular request' in Nippon Cultural Broadcasting Inc., the most influential and popular among Japanese western music ranking programs then. It means there was almost no time difference about The Beatles' movement between Japan and America at least among western music listeners. Finally The Beatles released thirteen singles in that year, and the situation where a few songs of them raked in the chart every week continued.
One theory says the first moment when one of The Beatles' songs was broadcast was 'My Bonnie Lies Over' in 1961 that they recorded with Tony Sheridan as his back band. However as for the matter after they debuted as a professional musician officially, it's said it was when a DJ, Itoi Goro introduced ' Love Me Do' when Nippon Broadcasting System, Inc. broadcast 'The Best of Britain' produced by BBC in February,1963. But at this stage, The Beatles hadn't become a movement even in UK yet, so it was difficult for Japanese to respond to it well.
Starting with 'Please Please Me' in March,1963, The Beatles made a plenty of hits and arouse the big movement in UK. It seems that Japanese got the information from FEN of U.S.army bases from the late 1963, but in general radio stations, the best theory tells there was increasing interest in The Beatles when 'Please Please Me' was broadcast on the above-mentioned '95 million popular request' on January 10th, 1964 under the introduction of 'This is the popular band that aroused a concert held by the UK court'. Yoshida Takuro, who lived in Iwakuni city, Yamaguchi prefecture then and Ayukawa Makoto of Sheena & The Rokkets, who lived in Itazuke,Fuokuoka city, prefecture talked they listened to The Beatles for the first time on FEN, and Inoue Yosui talked he listened to The Beatles for the first time on '95 million popular request' .
And from a few years before then, there had been increasing interest in vocal groups like The Four Seasons or The Ronettes and instrumental bands of electric guitars like The Shadows or The Ventures even on Japanese western music charts. And The Beach Boys, which sang their original songs combined with those two things,appeared. So the appearance of The Beatles was necessary in that process. And in the case of The Beatles, its influence became to spread easily because of sophistication like their cute looks,suits without collars, mushroom cut, and 'A Hard Days Night', a movie of them opened to the public in July,1964 (October in Japan), spurred their popularity.
And there was increasing interest in the presence of 'rock band' after The Beatles appeared, and bands in UK, which was a treasury of rock bands, went to America one after another and got enormous popularity. It became to be called 'British Invasion' or 'British Beat' and the wave came to Japan, The Dave Clark Five, The Animals, Peter & Gordon, Manfred Mann, and The Rolling Stones, which would be the best rival to The Beatles,debuted in Japan and appeared on the western music charts one after another. There were several difference about their birth place or the tendency of their sounds, but all of them were launched out as if they had been from Liverpool in Japan, including even The Rolling Stones. It was the period where images to remember easily were put importance on the most.
The electric guitar movement has come in.
However there was one problem about The Beatles. It was very difficult for Japanese at the stage of 1964 to cover their songs in technique. In the same year, 3 Funkies ,an idol vocal group (It was because they covered the above-mentioned 'My Bonnie Lies Over') and The Tokyo Beatles, which jumped on the bandwagon of The Beatles movement and made the band right then, released The Beatles' covers. But in their songs, the guitar part was replaced with sax because it was very difficult to reproduce it then.
However the electric guitar movement came in in January,1965. It was brought by the big success of a concert at The Astronauts in Japan by The Ventures, a guitar instrumental band from America. The number of young people who hadn't listened to western music itself, but took electric guitars influenced by the concert was increasing suddenly. And ' Electric Guitar Tournament' started to be broadcast by Fuji Television Network, Inc. ,which had its eye on the phenomenon expand the popularity, and ' Electric Guitar Wakadaisho' a movie led by Kayama Yuzo was opened to the public in December, the movement became decisive. Added a TV program and a movie, the movement became to spread easily.
Young people who made big sounds that had never heard disposed the board of education in Ashikaga city, Tochigi prefecture to impose the law banning electric guitars. Since then, the movement to oppress electric guitars had brisk up at schools nationally. Parental generation thought 'Electric guitars made young people become delinquent' seriously. The interesting thing here is difference between Japan and America.. In America, people oppressed rock 'n' roll for a prejudiced, but logical reason like 'It's terrible that you imitate discriminated black people ! ' based on racial discrimination against black people. However, that cultural background didn't spread to Japan, so people tried to oppress it for just a sensuous reason like 'Noisy!' though it didn't become a problem that Elvis Presley's songs were shown at Kohaku Uta Gassen. Here, an image against rock like 'Adults don't understand it' spread in Japan.
And, in this electric guitar movement, the theme The Ventures made was surfing, but The Beach Boys ,which made the same thing its theme, was popular in Japan too, moreover, it was much more popular than the other surfing bands in America. However at the stage of 1965, they and Jan and Dean sang 'Hot Rod' on the theme of custom cars or motorbikes. Above all, 'Little Honda' released by The Beach Boys in 1964 was the first song in the world on the theme of the performance of Japanese motorcycles and there was an atmosphere to tell the beginning of Japan as a motorcycle super power.
By the way, according to western rock texts, 1965 was the year when folk rock like Bob Dylan or The Byrds arose as 'the answer from America for The Beatles'. They were introduced to Japan on that year, but didn't make hits generally probably because of electric guitar movement. Rather, in 1966, one year after then, Dylan, Joan Baez, Simon & Garfunkel, Sonny & Cher, The Lovin' Spoonful, Donovan started to sell. It was from the influence that college Japanese folk movement occurred right then and Mike Maki, Araki Ichiro, The Broadside Four, Moriyama Ryoko made hits. As introduced in the former chapter, musicians that were characterized by their accompaniment of folk guitars and beautiful harmony like The Brothers Four, The Kingston Trio, Peter, Paul & Marry were popular in Japan then, so protest musicians were very minority still then. The first time a Dylan's album was release in Japan was in autumn in 1965, which was four years later to in America.
Finally The Beatles held a concert in Japan
The Beatles - Live in Japan (Full Performance)
In June,1966, The Beatles held a concert in Japan finally. One year before then, in the August number of 'Music Life', the editor in chief, Hoshika Rumiko went to London and succeeded in the meeting interview with The Beatles. And Peter & Gordon, The Honey comes, The Animals, Herman's Hermits held theirconcerts in Japan then. So you can tell that they became familiar presence, and the moment people longed for came in finally. It was Kyodo Kikaku that invited The Beatles. They planed The Ventures' concert and pioneered in electric guitar movement in the previous year.
However the place they chose for the concert became a big problem. It was Nippon Budokan, the sacred place for Judo, a national sport. For the promoter, as a result of looking for 'the biggest indoor hall in Japan', he had only choice of it, but for those who insisted on Japanese patriotism, it was unallowable that foreigners who had unusual long hair as men then used the place for the national sport. The criticism spread to people of culture, and even the prime minister, Sato Eisaku joined in it. And the feeling of oppression against electric guitars taht started in the previous year was added to it, anti people's hate doubled.
However the popularity of The Beatles wasn't so weak that it didn't shrink from such conservative people's oppression. Their concerts in the five part series, which had been held from Jun 30th to July 2nd, were a great success every day, and the concert in daytime of July 1st was broadcast to the whole country by Nippon Television Network Corporation. Finally the oppressive disturbance before they came to Japan led young people's curiosity against The Beatles to arouse and the presence of rock bands became bigger than before in Japan.
The Beatles stopped their concert activity at San Francisco live on August 29th,1966 as their last concert two months after then, and they had never held any concerts officially until they split. The countries they visit for their concerts during their active period were only 9 countries like UK, Sweden, Ireland, France, America, Canada, Germany, Japan, Philippine. Considering the fact, Japan was one of precious countries about it.
The period of 'Band=Idol'
June,1966 when The Beatles came to Japan was one of the turning points for rock. The Beach Boys released 'Pet Sounds' one month before then, and The Beatles relreased 'Revolver' in the early August, both of which are always in the top of stream of votes like 'Rock All Time Album' all around the world. However, strangely the former bothered their fans all around the world including Japan and the latter made their fans who love the style of early Beatles have doubts about the band. They weren't highly evaluated then like in later years. As symbolized by such things, An image like 'band = idol' had lasted for a while after then and they made the gravure of western music journals like 'Music Life' or 'Teen Beat' gaily. Of course, the most popular one was The Beatles, and The Rolling Stones was the second most popular after them. And it was because of their skill to make an image of 'bad guys' and idol of Mick Jagger more than its music.
Scott Walker Sez: "Eat A Chocolate"
And there The Walker Brothers, and The Monkeys, which should have been called 'the answer from American TV to the movies led by The Beatles', appeared. The Monkeys was popular all around the world from the influence of TV dramas led them that was broadcast all around the world. The unique one was The Walker Brothers. They were somewhat popular in UK or America., but their popularity in Japan was remarkable. It was because three of them including Scott Walker who sang in beautiful baritone voice were all beautiful, and their music style was like chanson, so those who were unfamiliar with rock understood it easily. And it's said that it was plotted by Music Life that was afraid that fans left The Beatles that matured from an idol together with the record company they belonged to. The Walker Brothers came to Japan many times, and appeared on a TV commercial of 'Fujiya Look Chocolate' unusually as a foreign performer. This popularity of The Walker Brothers had been regarded as a kind of Japanese origin, but in later years, the musical evaluation of Scott Walker as a vocalist or a song writer was increasing in UK rock so much that a documentary movie '30 Century Man' ,which followed his music life, was produced in 2007.
And The Bee Gees from Australia had the same beautiful harmony and idol alike The Walker Brothers, and they received attention early and were so popular that their single 'Massachusetts' in 1968 ranked first on Oricon chart , which was an official one established right then, for the first time as a foreign artist.
What is the real of London scene ?
However it's undeniable that the partiality of idol line made Japanese tend to have one - sided understanding of it though they could have experienced many kinds of UK bands then. Japanese liked so-called fresh and light beats symbolized as 'Liverpool sound', but in London, maniac young artists represented by The Rolling Stones gathered in some jazz clubs and covered blues artists like Maddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, John Lee Hooker whom white people had never listened to in America.. And then The Rolling Stones or The Yardbirds changed them to their original rock 'n' roll and moved the precept of rock.
London then was the center of not only music, but also fashions, so which was called 'swinging London' then. It showed in that Twiggy, a super model then, came to Japan in 1967 and arouse mini skirt movement. However ' Mods' like The Who, The Kinks, The Small Faces, which were fashion leaders in UK music then, failed to spread in Japan. Only The Who made a small hit with 'Happy Jack'. It was 10 years later that Japanese understood Mods, a original punk, where working class young people dressed up only the weekend, talked about 'my generation' in their own words, and played powerful guitar chords that was called 'power chord', on the other hand young people who played blues sessions at jazz clubs were from the wealth.
Unprecedented Idol movement occurred in GS
And from around the late 1966's, the scene of bands influenced by The Beatles became remarkable in Japan. It became decisive when The Blue Comets received the grand prix of Japan Record Awards in 1967, and people called the movement 'Group Sounds (GS)'.
In this movement, the scene was led by The Blue Comets from western music at the beginning, Kamayatsu Hiroshi, Inoue Takayuki, Ono Katsuo who had been musicians since western & rockabilly period, The Spiders ,which put Sakai Masaaki and Inoue Jun of idols its front men, The Blue Jeans of Terauchi Takeshi who had flourished since electric guitar movement, Wild Ones of Kase Kunihiko who was a talented making songs by themselves.
However the reason GS got explosive popularity was the appearance of some super idols. Backed up by producers of 'The Hit Parade' like Sugiyama Koichi etc. and added explosive popularity of Sawada Kenji, a front man, The Tigers became the most popular GS band around the late 1960's. Since then, they had sent many songs into hit charts one after another, and They produced movies led by them alike The Beatles, and they realized the concert at Nippon Bodokan for the first time as a Japanese artist.
The Tempters - Legend of Emerald
Following The Tigers of this, The Tempters ,which put Hagiwara Kenichi its frontman, or OX ,which drew attention from their faint performance on the stage, became popular idols. They were welcomed passionately by girls' cartoons, 'Margaret' 'Nakayoshi' 'Syojo Friend' held popularity polls about them and had supplements of them, and drew them as cartoon characters. This kind of 'aestheticism' became a model of Queen or the enthusiasm of Visual kei in later Japan.
GS bands were criticized easily because they sang Kayokyoku - like minor ballads in their singles and they were managed by show biz production companies. However it wasn't rare in UK too that the percentage of bands that made songs by themselves wasn't high. And it was only Australia and Hollands besides UK and America in the world which could supply so many domestic bands that they occupied the top stream on the chart, and Japan was one of such countries. In fact, Rolling Stone, a American rock magazine, got to be interested in the movement of GS so much that they had them make The Tigers the cover of the April number of it in 1969.
